Cancer Journey Quotes

What happened with cancer was that I just became a body. There was nothing else but body for a month. I was chemo'd and operated on and cut and poked. At first it was really horrifying and scary, and then it was just,Wow. You're in your body. This is body!

When I hear a guy lost a battle to cancer, that really did bother me, that that's a term. It implies that he failed and that somebody else that defeated cancer is heroic and courageous.

Before my diagnosis [cancer] I was a competitor but not a fierce competitor. When I was diagnosed, that turned me into a fighter.

I've been a rock star since you were very young. But I've never encountered anything as powerful as cancer.

People talk about the courage of cancer patients, and I do not deny that courage. I had been poked and stabbed and poisoned for years, and still I trod on. But make no mistake: In that moment, I would have been very, very happy to die.

I first found out I had cancer on my eye and lost an eye to this disease when I was 16, and I've since had cancer in my kidneys and pancreas and a host of other areas.

When you receive a cancer diagnosis, you're more vulnerable than at any other time in your life. I've personally had the experience twice. My only hope for survival was alternatives. But that was my decision, what I thought was best for me.

I was asleep at the wheel before cancer shook me awake.

When they told me I had cancer - a very rare form called appendiceal cancer - I was shocked. But I went straight into battle mode. Every morning, I'd wake up and have an internal conversation with cancer. 'All right, dude,' I'd tell it, 'go ahead and hit me. But I'm going to hit you back even harder.'

Cancer was the most terrifying, arduous, painful thing, but it was also a profound gift in the sense that I was holding so much in my body for so many years that was dark and terrifying which was preventing my coming back into myself.

Cancer is really hard to go through and it's really hard to watch someone you love go through, and I know because I have been on both sides of the equation.

In talking about my cancer with family and friends, I feel the love that I know will get me through this. The old strategy of suffering in silence could not have been more misguided.

I feel so fortunate and grateful to be a survivor of breast cancer. I see it as a gift.

My mom [has] always been my hero. Watching her experience something like breast cancer was pivotal, I think in my whole family's life and experience. She is one strong lady.

I'm the exact same person I was before (cancer). I'm still shallow, I still love clothes, I still want to talk fashion, I still want to gossip, so lay it on me.

The first thing is how awful cancer was, the experience. When you first go through it, you're just trying to survive. But when I wrote about it, I really digested it. It was unbearable but I had practice behind me.

I had throat cancer, and I had to have radiation treatments, and I couldn't sing for a long time; and this was in '97. I had 28 radiation treatments. I didn't die, thank God.

The truth is, if you asked me to choose between winning the Tour de France and cancer, I would choose cancer. Odd as it sounds, I would rather have the title of cancer survivor than winner of the Tour, because of what it has done for me as a human being, a man, a husband, a son, and a father.

I'm no different than others with cancer. I just happen to play professional baseball. I'm part of those statistics that cancer has touched as well.

I had a ringside seat to cancer. As have most people.

I haven't talked much about being an ovarian cancer survivor because I don't really want to define myself that way.

One of the most beautiful experiences our family shared was feeling the love and bond that came to life when my mother was battling her ovarian cancer. In a way, it brought our family together and opened up relationships and a closeness that was not felt before her diagnosis.

Cancer has been unfortunately in my life. My mom's best friend is kicking ass in her battle with breast cancer. Both of my grandmas had cancer. I recently lost a friend to cancer.

I'm an 18-years thriver, I call myself, not a survivor, because I feel like I'm in thriving my life even better than I ever have, and I want to encourage other women that are going through this journey that here I am.

Both of our daughters, Debbie and Bonnie, are also cancer survivors.